Underdog Blog – Fairfax Criminal Defense Lawyer | Virginia DUI Attorney

Praised be Virginia’s Court of Appeals for last week further distinguishing the factors separating a mere hunch — which does not justify a police frisk or search — from a Terry  frisk based on reasonable articulable suspicion to believe the suspect is armed and dangerous....

Death penalty: Always unjust Virginia executed John Allen Muhammad before he was to have completed his first round of federal habeas corpus appeals. Concurring Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens — joined by Justices Ginsburg and Sotomayor — underlined the importance of completing the first round...

Photo from website of U.S. District Court (W.D. Mi.). On the one hand, I believe strongly in providing an aggressive defense to everyone suspected of a crime. On the other hand, rogue cops who commit crimes shielded by their badges certainly would present a challenge to...

Bill of Rights. (From the public domain.) When may a court order a criminal defendant drugged to be competent to stand trial? In the Fourth Circuit, the prosecution must justify such an order by clear and convincing evidence. U.S. v. Barbara Michelle Bush, ___ F.3d ___...

Bill of Rights. (From the public domain.)  Do you have a burning desire to talk to the police, even though doing so with real cops might get you arrested and prosecuted? If so, go watch Cops and talk to the television screen instead. For a decade,...

Image from public domain. In late 2006, I blogged about getting a thirty-plant Maryland marijuana felony prosecution reduced to a simple marijuana possession conviction, and a medical marijuana sentence of a $100 fine plus court costs, which ultimately was converted to a probation before judgment. ...

Thanks to Ardmore, Pennsylvania, trial lawyer Anna Durbin for authorizing me to post her attached excellent email message responding to a listserv discussion about how lawyers prepare their clients to testify at trial. I have known Anna for many years, through our having attended the Trial...

Photo from website of U.S. District Court (W.D. Mi.). Maryland follows the Frye/Reed test for admitting expert testimony into evidence: “[B]efore a scientific opinion will be received as evidence at trial, the basis of that opinion must be shown to be generally accepted as reliable...

Photo from website of U.S. District Court (W.D. Mi.). Jurors give scripts to themes, e.g. armed robbery. If prosecution evidence does not fit with the jurors’ scripts — for instance, if the armed robbery defendant looks like a computer nerd who would not and could...

What is the meaning of the Sixth Amendment right to effective assistance of counsel — and the Fifth and Fourtheenth Amendment right to due process — if prosecutors communicate directly with unrepresented criminal defendants soon after their arrests, to start the clock on short court...